Hearing on GAO report
A story reported by the Associated Press, that was also published on Aug 30th, talked about the GAO report and the push-back from the White House on it's less than optimistic findings:
The GAO report concludes that at least 13 of the 18 benchmarks set to judge the Iraqi government's performance in the political and security arenas have not been met, according to The Associated Press.
"We have provided the GAO with information which we believe will lead them to conclude that a few of the benchmark grades should be upgraded from `not met' to `met,"' Morrell said. He would not say which of the grades the Pentagon disputed.
White House officials said the GAO report, which was required by legislation President Bush signed last spring, was unrealistic because it assigned "pass or fail" grades to each benchmark. They contend auditors should simply have assessed whether the Iraqis have made progress toward reaching the goals.
White House deputy press secretary Dana Perino said the report does not take into consideration some positive steps, such as the Sunni tribes' cooperation in the fight against al-Qaida. However, the administration agreed that Iraq has not reached some objectives.
This hearing can be viewed live on the web at two locations; The Senate Foreign Relations committee website or on the C-Span 3 webcast channel.
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There is a link to the full GAO Report on theThink Progress site.
Think Progress also has a handy guide to what the Benchmarks were and how the Administration was graded on them.
The hearing has started. Sen. Kerry has emphasized the GAO report is non-partisan. It will measure whether what the Iraqi government has promised it would do whether it achieved that.
Inside the hearing room:
JK: September is Here
He’s on. Giving on nod to the non-partisan approach of the GAO and noting that the members of the committee are demonstrating a high level of interest in the report as gauged by their presence at the hearing.
JK: the whole point of the escalation was to create breathing space so the Iraqi government could meet key political benchmarks. Nobody argues that you can have a tactical advantage by putting more troops in certain areas. That is not at issue. Iraqis have met very few benchmarks.
Sen. Kerry talks about how the Bush administration keeps “moving the gold posts”. That sure is true.
Says that we can not continue to ask Americans to die for a policy that is wrong and shifting rationales.
There appears to be a full compliment of Senators there. I thought I saw Sens Hagel and Sununu there, as well as a number of Democrats. This is an important hearing. There should be some good questions asked.
Only 2 of 9 security benchmarks met.
1 political benchmark met and one partially met.
This is not a lot.
JK says that the benchmarks listed as met are less significant in what they represent than the benchmarks not made. Walker said the least progress were on the political ones - the very thing the surge was meant to facilitate.
Lugar going through history. Says that Saddam kept Iraq under control as a tyrant. Questions if Iraqis want to be Iraqis. Says we may be training people of each group - shiite, Sunni, and Kurds who will all right each other. Says critics say we shouldn’t have started this - and says that is fair enough but we are there.
Questions whether there is a solution other than what they had “for 15 years”.
Walker answered a question from Lugar on whether or not the Iraqis want one nation. He said the Iraqi legislature has not made much progress on this, but does not know if the Iraqi people think differently from the Iraqi legislature.
OK, signing out and in again works!
Sitting here in the room: JK is steely and focused. OH--and sane. Lugar seems a little off..confused...unclear about just who is supporting hegemony.
Walker is nonpartisan and walking the line; it is good to hear where the middle of the road is.
JK—angered by what Pres. said yesterday, “Not a nervous reaction to poll results.” Yeah, he looks angry too.
Senator Kerry angered by Bush’s remarks yesterday talking about “nervous politicians taking a poll”. I agree that it was a preposterous and arrogant remark. If anyone is nervous it is Bush—about his own legacy. He’s the one who botched Iraq.
A few issues with the sound on CSPAN3. I missed some of the remarks.
Hagel asks - “Is there a functioning government - defined as able to defend and support it self. Walker say 15 out of 37 ministers have withdrawn support of government. There are problems in the ministries that have NOT withdrawn support. On basic services, it is difunctional.
Terri--sent photos.
Does anyone else think this is a little bombshell? Coleman goes to Iraq and sees decreased violence. Walker/GAO gets August UNclassified data and it looks terrible.
DOES ANYONE KNOW WHAT’S GOING ON HERE ?
Senator Coleman just back from Iraq, where he was with Petraeous - questioning the time frame for the report card. Walker - military couldn’t provide data, but spoke to people in military to get input through August 30. The classified report shows different trends and different numbers from different sources. Coleman suggesting it is better - and he saw more recent info.
Kerry saying August always down _ countering Coleman.
Coleman says fight in Anbar is the center of fight with AlQaeda - but the local population has turned against them.
Sen. Kerry said, back in Nov/Dec of 2005 that the Sunnis in Al-Anbar did not want ‘the foreign fighters’ meaning Al Qaeda in their area and would eventually evict them. This is nothing new. It was anticipated.
Walker on the benchmarks:
They haven’t been met, they keep on slipping and there needs to be more transparency
Lugar made the point that it may not be that Malicki failed, but that his goals are different. This was after saying that Iraq’s Shiite’s may want a Shiite government - not our democracy with rights to the minority.
Senator Kerry rightly corrects Senator Coleman who claims those who want to change Iraq policy don’t want to fight al Qaeda. Kerry calls that debating “strawmen”.
The hearing just ended. It will be interesting to see if the talking heads mention this GAO report which flies in the face of all of Bush’s happy talk.
Great job all. Thanks. I’m watching the rebroadcast on C-Span 1.
Reshown on c-span2 tomorrow at 7:10am, hopefully.
Sorry I couldn’t make it for the liveblog, but I did get to watch live online. This was a fascinating hearing, and JK’s past points on sectarian violence, and the need for political reconciliation, are as relevant as ever.
I wish you all the best, Mr. Kerry. Hope you will come to Czech Republic soon. The country your roots come from allways wellcome you.
I didn’t watch the Hearing; although I would have loved to if only I had cable services. But I noticed in John Kerry’s opening remarks that he indicated that the president was using the same old line that troops may eventually be withdrawn if progress is shown in Iraq. The dangling carrot.
To put this into perspective, laughably so, I came across a line in the El Paso Times on Tuesday which completely contradicts that. I mentally marked it because I found it so immediately obscuring that I thought it was worth noting.
But there it says—and I’m paraphrasing—that Iraqi leaders in Baghdad have fallen short of the political progress that many in Congress are demanding to justify continuing the war. It’s in the article, “Bush calls Anbar province success story.”
What struck me when I read it is that it’s one of those Bush Administration going-nowhere constructs that leaves you no outcome. Are they saying that if we were to make progress in Iraq, that would justify continuing the war? On the other hand, if we don’t make progress, that also gives us reason to continue the war? So there it is, the “endless escalation.”
And of course it follows up with the obvious next line, having already compromised your intelligence, the line being one about an assessment released by the U.S. intelligence agencies where they call for “bottom-up” security initiatives, with Anbar as a model.
I hope other people can read this because it actually speaks very clearly to how it is that the American people are constantly taken off guard and compromised by the news media. Let’s just say, it’s a “need to know.”